


Just Like Us

by achievemenhunter



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Blood, Gore, M/M, Murder, Mutilation, Psychoteeth, Starvation, Torture, all that fun stufff, no smut though, surprisingly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-22
Updated: 2015-07-22
Packaged: 2018-04-10 15:52:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4397954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/achievemenhunter/pseuds/achievemenhunter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gavin gets kidnapped by two murderous psychopaths, but rather than becoming a victim of their unconventional 'hobby', they teach him something dark and twisted about himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Like Us

**Author's Note:**

> Another nonnie prompt! Here it is:
> 
> "Prompt: Mavinwood with Ryan and Michael Serial Killers/Psychopaths slowly turning their kidnapped victim Gavin like them. Sort of a Stockholm Syndrome and "you've been crazy all along" kind of vibe. Also wouldn't be opposed to smut? Anyway I'm glad your back <3 I love your fics so damn much <3 <3"
> 
> So there isn't any smut, but it's over 4,000 words long because I have bad self-control, so, yay?

Gavin jerked awake with the instant knowledge that something was wrong. His eyes flew open, heart racing, making a panicked sound as he realised he was shackled to a long chain dangling from the ceiling in an unfamiliar, windowless room.

 

Hysteria rose within him like an ugly, overwhelming shadow, and he yanked at the shackles around his wrists until he bled, eyes darting around as he looked for a possible means of escape. But the only way out seemed to be a door on the opposite side of the room to him, and if the side he could see was any indication, there were about six locks separating him from any chance of freedom.

 

It was at this point that his terror swallowed him whole, and he began to scream for help.

 

Hours seemed to pass as he wore vocal chords down from a shriek, to a hoarse shout, to a croak, to nothing at all. No one came. Defeated, he slumped back to the ground, ass on the cold concrete floor and arms forced to dangle from the chain suspended from the roof.

 

Several more hours passed, and still no one came. He was still scared and had no idea why or how he was wherever he was, but by now his fear had worn him thin and tired. Despite everything he fell into an uneasy doze, waking in fits and starts before his weary exhaustion dragged him back under.

 

He woke completely an indeterminate amount of time later and felt wildly, irrationally angry. There was no indication as to why he was chained and alone in this mystery room, no explanation as to why he'd been so rudely plucked from his life and abandoned here, with no guarantee that he'd ever safely make it home. Whatever the reason, though, it was clear that there was no way that his predicament would mean anything good. Panic swam through the anger, twining with it as he realised that he didn't know what he was more afraid of - that whoever had abducted him would return at some point and finish whatever it was that they'd started, or that they wouldn't come back at all.

 

Time stretched on without a way for Gavin to mark its passage, and with a tired, despondent acceptance he ceased to care. Everything seemed to be pointing towards the fact that no one was coming for him, that it would be years before someone even found his body and wondered what his shrivelled corpse was doing locked up in there. His stomach growled and he curled in on himself, feeling like he wanted to cry but he was too drained to actually go through with it. Instead, his eyes wandered listlessly around the room, occasionally landing on something and spending several minutes fixated by it. He became intimately familiar with the smears and swirls of dust and mould gathered in all the corners of the room, the crackling map of dried blood ringed around his wrists, every chink and scratch of every link of the chain tethering him to the ceiling.

 

The grumbling complaints of his digestive system gradually grew to an agonising roar as his body yearned for nutrition he couldn't provide. Eventually he lost the motivation to even look around, head down and arms numb from being suspended above him for so long. He barely had the energy to keep his eyes open, fixed unseeing on an uninteresting patch of floor.

 

When he tried to swallow, he found his throat just as dry as before, lips parched and cracked. Despite his desperate need for fluids, the insistent swollen press of his bladder had other ideas, and before long he found himself sitting in a puddle of his own urine, warm for a moment before cooling to an uncomfortable, clammy chill. Somehow he mustered the strength to feel ashamed, and probably would have cried if he hadn't been so intent on keeping what liquid remained in his body exactly where it was. His wooden tongue ran over his broken lips reflexively, dragging like sandpaper. The seat of his pants remained damp, but the front eventually dried, leaving his jeans stiff and uncomfortable. He barely cared - it was really just a vague buzz of irritation in the background of the fact that he was slowly dying.

 

His body wasn't finished betraying him, however, and what might have been a few hours or a few days later, Gavin shit his pants as well, squelching just a little with the slight movements of his rattling breaths.

 

He hadn't realised just how thoroughly degrading it was to die of starvation.

 

The locks on the door clicked open one by one, but Gavin hardly noticed until the door was open, a soft wash of fresh air ghosting over him. Gentle hands helped him into an upright position, crooning words of encouragement as they unlocked the shackles around his wrists. He let out a dry groan as his blood rushed painfully back into the limbs. Briefly, he passed out, and when he came to again he was already outside of the room he'd resigned himself to dying in. He tried to lift his head to look at his saviours, but the action was so far beyond him that he fell straight back into the roaring black of unconsciousness.

 

When he woke again he was being led into a small apartment, far more well-furnished than the room he'd been trapped in but continuing the theme of an absolute lack of windows. The people carrying him manoeuvred him to the couch, settling him down on cushions that felt like the softest thing in existence after his eternity spent on a concrete floor. His head fell back, leaving him with nowhere to look but the ceiling. Still, it was something different to that cursed room, and Gavin was grateful for what little he could see of his new scenery.

 

His rescuers returned, gently coaxing him to lift his head so that they could tip a large glass against his dry, dry lips. Something gloriously liquid and cool washed into Gavin's mouth, feeling vaguely fizzy as it trickled down Gavin's throat. He vaguely heard one of them say something about electrolytes and that he needed to take it slow. An impatient whine built in his throat at the lazy rate that the liquid was flowing into his mouth, nearly causing him to choke. Didn't they know he was practically at the point of complete dehydration? He _needed_ to have the drink faster.

 

But he was in no position to force them to do anything, and it was several minutes before he'd drained the glass. His rescuers then lift-carried him to the bathroom, peeling off his clothes and turning the shower on to full blast. Gavin groaned as he was eased under the spray, impossibly happy to have the filth and grime clinging to his body washed away. He didn't care about his nakedness in the slightest, and even felt almost human as he was towelled dry and helped into new clothes. From there, he was led to a bedroom and lifted onto the bed, and he was so worn thin and the blankets were so warm that he was asleep again before he could even take a proper look at his rescuers' faces.

 

~* * *~

 

He woke several hours later to find another glass of the electrolyte drink sitting on the bedside table next to him. He could barely lift it, and sloshed a decent portion onto his new clothes and the bedcovers, but still managed to get most of it in his mouth, now having the presence of mind not to guzzle it down. The glass thunked heavily against the nightstand as he clumsily set it back in place, narrowly avoiding knocking it onto the floor.

 

At some point during his slumber, his saviours seemed to have bandaged his wrists, hiding the damage he'd caused himself in trying to get loose of those cruel shackles. He didn't like looking at his hands - they'd always been thin, but now they were close to emaciated. His eyes drifted, and so did his mind, falling into an indulgent half-daze. The smallest of smiles lifted the corners of his mouth, feeling irrationally satisfied about the simple act of lying on a bed. Strange what a few days of slowly dying made you appreciate.

 

His focus sharpened as the door opened, two men that he could only assume were the ones who had rescued him entering. They both smiled at the sight of him awake, the taller one taking the lead as they approached. "Look who's back in the land of the living and lucid," he said, voice a rich tenor that made Gavin instantly feel calm.

 

"Good to see you up. Y'know, figuratively speaking," the second man added, dimples framed by freckles and curly auburn hair. Gavin's eyes tracked them as they both sat at the end of his bed, one either side. "You got a name there?"

 

"Gavin," he managed to croak, hating how weak and rusty his voice sounded.

 

The curly haired man grinned anyway. "Nice to meet you, Gavin. I'm Michael, and this is Ryan. We're the ones who saved you from that room. Do you know what that means?"

 

Gavin managed the minutest shake of his head.

 

Michael patted his blanketed knee in a friendly manner, entirely at odds with the sinister smile suddenly stretching across his face. "It means we own you now."

 

A small, confused noise escaped Gavin's throat, his eyes suddenly wide and confused as he tried to force his frail body into getting away from the other men. He barely got into a seated position before collapsing again, what little energy he'd regained spent. Ryan gave his leg a comforting squeeze.

 

"Don't worry, nothing will happen while you're still like this," Ryan told him kindly. "We need to get you good and healthy first. Why don't we give you some peace and quiet so you can rest, hm?" So saying, he stood, Michael rising with him, and they left, the door closing and locking behind them. Not that Gavin had the strength to make it to the door in the state he was in anyway. Helplessly, he remained bedridden, but despite everything, his body betrayed him once again and dragged him back to sleep.

 

~* * *~

 

This time, when he woke, there was a milkshake waiting for him on the bedside table. Briefly he contemplated ignoring it, or smacking it to the floor, but for how little he wanted to be well enough for whatever Michael and Ryan had planned for him, he wanted to revisit his flirtation with starvation even less. With shaky hands, he reached for the glass, teeth catching on the straw protruding from the frothy top of the milkshake. He took an exploratory sip.

 

It was delicious.

 

He soon found himself slurping down the entirety of the drink so quickly that once he was done, he instantly fell back against the pillows, nauseous. His cheeks bulged and he belched, but in the end his body didn't seem to want to go through the effort of actually throwing up.

 

After about an hour or so passed, the nausea faded, and he felt strong enough to sit up a little. He shoved his pillows behind his back to help prop himself up, and getting into the sitting position in the first place left him sweating, but he wasn't entirely exhausted by the effort this time and it was a damned sight better than he had been doing.

 

Then boredom settled in and he dozed off again, this time sleeping for a solid ten hours, only waking when his stomach reminded him how important consistent sustenance was. This time he had a small bowl of potatoes and a thin gravy, lukewarm from how long it had been sitting there, but he ate it nonetheless.

 

Time passed in much this manner, eating and sleeping at such regular intervals that Gavin began to strongly suspect that Michael and Ryan were drugging his food. There was little choice for him but to eat, though. He wasn't going to put his body through the ordeal of starvation again if he could help it. And he did owe it to Ryan and Michael, in a way, since they _had_ rescued him from that room - granted, there was every chance they'd put him there in the first place, but something in his mind was still associating them with the kind act of freedom.

 

Before long, Gavin found himself able to crawl out of bed and slowly totter around the room, gradually regaining the ability to walk relatively normally.

 

It was at about this point that Gavin was moved during one of his drug-induced slumbers, into a room almost as big again as the apartment he'd been in previous. The more important part of the move, however, was the fact that Gavin was strapped to a chair, once again bound against his will. The walls were adorned with an array of sharp and painful-looking utensils, the only bare space being that just below a set of manacles sunk into the wall. Ominous dark red and brown stains marked the space. Gavin struggled frantically, but although the binds were soft, they were firm, looking like the kind you would expect in a psych ward. At least their softness kept him from aggravating his still-tender shackle wounds for the large part, only chafing slightly from his excessive tugging before he finally gave up.

 

Several long, agonising hours passed where Gavin grew more and more convinced that he'd been left to starve all over again before the door opened. Michael and Ryan entered, and he almost sobbed with relief and fear. They circled behind him, like sharks in the water, and his shoulders hunched upwards, forcing down the tears.

 

"I don't think he wants to talk to us," Ryan murmured, sounding genuinely upset.

 

"Well that's rude. We fucking saved his ass and nursed him back to health, what more does he want? Ungrateful piece of shit."

 

Gavin flinched and Ryan tutted.

 

"It's not his fault, Michael. He's just a little confused, I'm sure. Aren't you, Gavin?"

 

Even as frightened as he was, Gavin found himself nodding. It was true, after all; their actions didn't make any sense. Ryan patted him gently on one of his hunched shoulders.

 

"Well, it's pretty clear-cut, really. We think you're more like us that you're willing to admit, or even realise at all. That's what we're here to help with." He made a gesture to Michael, who grinned and left. Gavin watched him go, eyes glued to the door after he'd gone and even more tense than before. Ryan laughed.

 

"What're you going to do to me?" Gavin asked, voice quavering. Ryan laughed again.

 

"Nothing, if you play your cards right. The aim here isn't to hurt you, Gavin, we just want you to understand what you really are. It's up to you if we need to… _encourage_ you a little along the way."

 

There was a dim commotion outside the door, then Michael dragged a rather unkempt man into the room, literally kicking and screaming. The man's actions were sluggish and erratic, however, with no real power behind him, and Gavin got the sense he wasn't in complete control of his faculties. Ryan helped Michael wrestle the man into the manacles hanging from the wall, and the man gave them a few hard tugs before slumping in defeat, long brown hair hanging over his bespectacled face.

 

Then the two psychopaths returned their attention to Gavin, who tried not to shift under their scrutiny.

 

"There's just one question you need to answer," Ryan told him calmly. "It's simple, don't worry." He gestured between Gavin and the man now chained to the wall. "Only one of you needs to get hurt here, and I want you to choose."

 

Gavin stared. He knew what the brave answer was; he knew how society would expect him to answer if he were a decent human being.

 

"Him," he said instead, with barely a split second's hesitation.

 

"What the fuck!" The man exploded with a high-pitched, indignant cry, eyes wide and wild. Ryan and Michael smiled beatifically.

 

"See, there you go," Michael grinned. "You're way more willing to hurt others over yourself. You're making a great start."

 

The Brit hung his head in shame, trying to ignore his intense relief and sense of almost-pride at Michael's praise.

 

"Well," Ryan drawled lazily, "We'd better get to work then." He plucked a knife from the wall and unexpectedly flung it at the man chained to the wall, hitting him in the centre of his palm. The main howled in pain, involuntarily jerking his arm and making the injury worse. Blood wound in a lazy path down his wrist.

 

When his shrieking died down to low moans of pain, Ryan turned to Gavin again.

 

"I think it would be a good experience for you to tell us what you'd like us to do this gentleman." He patted the man's shoulder, earning a quiet whimper.

 

"He has a really manky beard," Gavin found himself saying. "I reckon you should carve it off."

 

The two psychopaths grinned and each selected a new knife from the wall, setting the blades against either of the man's cheeks. Steel dug through flesh and sliced neatly down, skin peeling away like the rind of a fruit. Ryan's free hand clamped around the man's jaw, holding him still as they methodically removed the skin from the lower half of his face. Chunks of hair and skin and blood dropped slowly from the man's chin, already past the point of looking human. Gavin's eyes dropped, sickened.

 

He'd done this. He'd caused someone to suffer like this.

 

"What next, Gav?" Michael asked cheerfully, like the mutilated man wasn't moaning in agony behind him.

 

Gavin shook his head.

 

"Gavin…" Ryan began in a warning tone, taking a step towards the captive Brit.

 

"Please just kill him already," he blurted. "Just cut his throat or something, I don't care, just don't leave him there like that!"

 

Michael glanced at Ryan, shrugged, and neatly slashed the blade across the man's neck. He was dead within seconds.

 

Gavin trembled in his seat, eyes fixed on the ground, as Ryan and Michael made their way to the sink in the corner of the room, sharing a lingering kiss before cleaning themselves off. He barely had the energy to flinch as they unstrapped him from the chair and escorted him back to his room, the door locked behind him.

 

Things continued in this pattern; Gavin would be kept confined in his bedroom with enough food to keep him content, then at some point while he was sleeping he'd be moved to the torture room and forced to dictate how Michael and Ryan killed people.

 

A short, stocky guy that Ryan filled with throwing knives so that he resembled a macabre pincushion, the blade that finally silenced him after almost an hour of hideous screaming buried in his throat.

 

A gangly, blue-eyed, artsy-looking type whose fingers were cut off by Michael, one by one, before lopping off both hands at the wrist, freeing him from the shackles holding him against the wall, only for his wounds to cause him to bleed out mere minutes later.

 

Gavin found himself desensitised alarmingly quickly, still gagging on the sticky smell of blood but feeing more numbness than horror as he watched Michael and Ryan's murderous work. After all, every person that they killed was simply another time they didn't take the opportunity to kill him instead, and Gavin didn't doubt that they would have killed them anyway if he'd taken the fall rather than them. There was no point in throwing his life away for people who were already doomed, and eventually Gavin stopped feeling any remorse at all for their deaths.

 

Shortly after, there was a break in the routine.

 

When Gavin woke in the torture room for the umpteenth time, there wasn't anyone shackled to the wall. Instead, a short Hispanic man was strapped to a waist-height table, eyes darting from Michael, to Ryan, to Gavin, with equal amounts of fear and confusion.

 

"Where am I? What d'you want from me?"

 

Gavin almost sighed at the man's naïve innocence, only holding his tongue because he knew that he would have been reacting the same way not too long ago.

 

Ryan was absently flipping one of his numerous throwing knives, and a detached part of Gavin's mind wondered why, considering their latest victim was lying down.

 

It was at that point that Gavin realised that the bonds looped around his wrists and ankles weren't fastened at all, and he was easily able to slip out of them and stand up. He gave the two other men an unsure look, eyes flickering to the dark-haired man trussed up on the table for the briefest of moments.

 

"It's your turn," Ryan said, blade spinning in another graceful arc before he caught it again. It had barely touched his palm before he'd sent it twirling upwards once more. Gavin found himself entranced by the motion, and so was caught off guard when Michael pressed the hilt of another knife into hand, curling his fingers around it before stepping back. Gavin stared at his hand for a good few seconds before realising the significance. His eyes flew to Michael's, then Ryan's, both of whom gave him encouraging smiles.

 

"Go on," Ryan urged.

 

Gavin's gaze locked with the man strapped to the table, and they both seemed to realise exactly what was going on at the same time.

 

"Please, don't do it," the man begged, terror written plain as day across his face as he began to writhe frantically.

 

Gavin turned his tortured eyes to Ryan, and the blond just raised an eyebrow, fingering the throwing knife.

 

Michael prompted him into action. "C'mon, you don't have to do much. Just cut him up a bit."

 

The Brit swallowed and turned back to the captive man.

 

He lowered the blade until it touched the man's sternum, and all the man's flailing suddenly stopped for fear of cutting himself. Gavin scored a shallow line over the skin and the man let out a pained sound as Gavin gagged at the smell of blood. The ever-present threat of Michael and Ryan behind him - the way Ryan hand been playing with the throwing knife making him feel like there was a massive target on his back - forced him to cut again, and again, deeper and deeper, blood was pervading all of Gavin's senses and the man was screaming, why was there always so much screaming, screaming so much, oh god why wouldn't he just stop screaming-

 

With a sudden, horrible silence, he did. The man's once-pained brown eyes now stared blankly, blood spread over his body, over Gavin's, dripping in steady drops from the table he'd been strapped to. The knife fell from Gavin's nerveless fingers, more of that sickeningly red blood flicking from the blade as it clattered on the floor.

 

He'd killed someone.

 

"…I'll admit, I wasn't expecting you go so far right away," Ryan said eventually, sounding admiring and even a little shocked. Gavin rounded on him, eyes wild and panicked.

 

"What d'you mean? Isn't this what you wanted me to do?"

 

Michael looked at him appraisingly. "We only asked you to cut him a bit, make him scream and bleed. Killing him was all you."

 

Gavin stared at his trembling, bloodstained fingers.

 

Murderer. Killer. He'd cut the man up until he'd bled out. Him. Gavin. He was a murderer.

 

"Are you gonna punish me for not listening to you?" he whispered, captivated and horrified in equal measure by the red slowly trickling down his arms. He still saw the other men grin in his periphery.

 

"Why would we do that? You've come along even better than we'd hoped for, Gavin. If you're already so ready to kill, I can't wait to see the results you achieve once you learn to enjoy it."

 

They stepped forward, arms open invitingly. Gavin didn't move to meet them, but he didn't back away either, even when they came closer and closer and finally wrapped their arms around him, murmuring words of praise and pride.

 

Any chance he had of backing out, Gavin realised, was gone the moment he'd sunk that knife into the man's chest. He returned the hug fiercely, filled with a swirl of confusing, terrifying emotions that he couldn't comprehend. There was no going back from what he'd just done.

 

Michael and Ryan were the only people who would accept him now.

 

"Welcome to the family," Ryan whispered in his ear, and it felt a disturbing amount like coming home.


End file.
